


Counterfeit of Blood

by MostRemote



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: Bodyswap, Child Abuse, Gen, Horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-06-07
Updated: 2012-07-01
Packaged: 2017-11-07 05:34:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/427444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MostRemote/pseuds/MostRemote
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Battle City is inexplicably cancelled, Mokuba realises that his brother's return from the Virtual World was not entirely successful. In fact, Kaiba Seto came back a different man entirely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Apprehension

**Author's Note:**

> This fic takes place after the Virtual World arc, specifically after episode 121, and diverges from canon there.

  


* * *

MAY 3rd

The man wearing Kaiba Seto's skin stood naked before a full mirror and assessed his reflection. He gave due interest to each body part, each pale skinned plane of flesh, each smooth groove of bone and cartilage, and judged each in distasteful turn. He ran experimental fingers over the hip and rib bones, disappointedly noting their prominent slopes and grey, wasted shadows. He looked instead to the lean muscles, the cold, handsome face – these he found satisfactory.

His attention turned to the scars, only vaguely more faded than they had been when he had last seen them. The rough, haphazard lashings on his back – these he gave a cursory glance, but he lingered with memory and affection over the deep, delicate marks that decorated the arms. Each with a story to tell, each a new lesson learned, placed so that Seto would see them every morning when dressing and be forced to revisit those lessons. Here, this one – thick, ugly, red – teaches you the value of restraint: do not talk back. And this, the pepper of infinite needle pricks, these tell you about obedience and submission. Your body is a classroom; it always will be.

If he had better learnt his lessons, perhaps his body would still be his own. Seto was long gone, now, of course. Every inch of his skull scrubbed clean – metaphorically speaking – and filled anew with someone stronger, someone better, someone who had refused to lose to the boy a third time.

Which made the victory just a little bitter, didn't it? When the father triumphs over the son, that victory always carries with it the knowledge that you've failed to teach them how to be better.

"Ever the disappointment, Seto," the man told his reflection.

_No matter_.

The man laughed a laugh that he found pleasantly similar to his own.

_It will have to do._

* * *

APRIL 29th

The three lilies floated on the skin of the ocean for some time before dipping under. Mokuba watched them from plane window for a little while, tracing their uneven path across the low waves. It was so strange to think that he had found and lost a brother in the last few, short hours, and stranger still to think that that brother had wanted to have them all killed. Yet he felt no resentment. Noa was just a lost thing, much like they had been. Perhaps Seto would have done the same, had he been in Noa's position.

Seto hadn't said a word about Noa since they had returned, but that was his way. Sometimes it was so difficult even for Mokuba to tell when his brother truly didn't care about something, and when he was only pretending not to. In fact, he hadn't said a word since they had escaped the Virtual World, not about Noa and not about anything – or anyone – else. Perhaps he was grieving. But for whom?

The lilies shrank into small, distant, delicate spots of white, the green blending away into the grey waves. He tried to keep them fixed in his view, but he soon lost the white flecks of the petals among those of the foam.

Well, grief was a private business, and not his to intrude upon. Mokuba forced himself to look away from the view of the ocean below, feeling a rare vertigo start to creep around him. Seto dealt with emotions practically. Mokuba tried to, for his brother's sake, but funerals were one of the things he still needed. Death rituals. Seto would have everybody cremated the moment their time of death was declared if he could. "Don't dwell on the past," he would say. Mokuba had not yet tried to explain that funerals were supposed to be a way of moving on from the past.

He made a slow, winding path towards the cockpit, trying to walk off his own thoughts, though his legs felt oddly heavy. Once he stepped through the door he cast his eyes about for Seto, expecting to see him stood among the pilots and working to set the plane back on its course to Alcatraz. He was instead greeted by Isono, standing at the console but bent at the waist so he could frantically enter commands into the computer before him. Flanking him, the two pilots seemed equally engaged in rapidly and clumsily flicking switches and pressing buttons on the panel before them. Not one of the men noticed his entrance.

"Mitsuaki, contact the mainland in case we need to refuel," Isono snapped at the pilot on his right, one-handedly typing something into a laptop. Mitsuaki began to protest, but several angrily flashing lights distracted his attention and he redirected his operations to another part of the panel.

Mokuba walked up slowly behind them, confused and mildly unsettled.

"What are you doing? We're going to go completely off course."

Isono turned quickly around, startled. "Master Seto's orders, sir," he said, looking away again, his attention entirely taken up by the insistent, flickering buttons laid out before him. Mokuba watched his fingers fly over the keys for a moment, too perplexed to react immediately. He watched the little map reorient itself, seeing the little avatar of their plane turn itself around and fly back the way it had come.

"Isono, what is this? We still have the finals at Alcatraz."

"I don't fully understand myself, sir," Isono said, hitting switches at an incredible pace and taking them further and further away from their planned destination. "He just said that it was cancelled."

" _What_ -? Cancelled?" Mokuba fell speechless. He stared at the map and the tiny plane, moving in a gradual line away from the grey circle that represented the long metal spine and smooth, canine spires that made up Alcatraz. "But... Isono, he's been planning this for months! It's Battle City.  _The_ Battle City!" He stared, eyes wide and brows tightly drawn together. "He built the duel tower, he had this blimp commissioned, he's spent  _months_  organising-"

"I know, Mokuba," Isono interrupted him, dropping the formalities. Mokuba might have been offended if the man didn't look as confused as he did. Confusion, painted over with the faintest layer of fear. Yes, Seto could be impulsive, but he didn't throw away months of work for no reason. "I don't know what's going on either. It's not my place, but you might have better luck trying to talk to him. I don't think there's much I can do."

Mokuba was already moving towards the door. They only had a certain amount of fuel and thus a rather tight amount of time to waste flying back and forth across the ocean. "Where is he? Our room?"

"I assume so," Isono called after him, but Mokuba was already gone, breaking into a run down the metal corridors and skidding as he turned. Something distant and inexplicable deep within him twitched with dread, uncurling itself, whispering  _danger, danger_  through his insides as he ran, dizzy with perturbation, through the skeleton of the jet, all that remained of the burnt and obliterated blimp.

* * *

Mokuba knocked on his brother's door four times with no answer before running his keycard through the scanner. He usually wouldn't have wanted to risk disturbing his brother's work this way, by forcing him to leave his desk and answer the door, but something was off. A thin but distinct layer of unease lay over everything, like snow, or ash, and everything in his being whispered,  _tread carefully_.

To his relief, Mokuba found his brother seated at his desk, the many computer screens humming blue around him and casting odd, unhealthy shadows across his face. He turned quickly when Mokuba entered, and Mokuba's smile immediately slipped from his face.

"Mokuba? How did you get in?"

Mokuba hesitantly held up his keycard. "The usual way."

"I see," Seto replied, eyeing the card with a strange, unpleasant expression. He gave a small shrug and then turned back to the screens, typing in an odd, slightly jerky fashion. Mokuba watched his fingers stumble slightly over the keys, fingers which would usually flow at speeds envied by even the most proficient of typists.

"Is something wrong, nii-sama?"

He didn't turn around. "No."

"Isono was worried," Mokuba said carefully, coming to stand beside his brother's chair. Seto still didn't so much as glance up at him.

"I don't see how his employer's emotional state is of any concern to him." An odd frown crossed Seto's face and he leaned back in his chair, staring hard at the screen before him. "Perhaps I should replace him."

Mokuba made a strangled, shocked sound. "Nii-sama, he was just concerned. Besides, it's Isono."

"He's only an employee, Mokuba," Seto said lightly, returning to his typing as if they were discussing the weather. "We can always get more."

"I guess," Mokuba said unsteadily, eyes drifting over what his brother was working on. He was even more unsettled when he realised that the page Seto had up was nothing related to Battle City at all. Instead, search results for Kaiba Corporation across several financial newspapers plastered the screens. Not recent entries, either; some were several years old. Mokuba dragged his eyes away and tried to hold onto the thread of conversation. "But Isono's been in the family for years. I thought you liked him."

"Ah." For a moment Seto seemed lost in thought, then he finally looked up at his brother with an expression that had been cut through with a sharp, almost pained cheeriness. "Well, perhaps I do. We'll keep him around, then." He turned once again to the computers, again acting as though his little brother wasn't even in the same room, let alone standing frightened an unsure at his shoulder.

Mokuba hovered behind him, the uncertainty swelling through him. He stared at the old electronic scans of Kaiba Corp.'s public announcements, their shift from weaponry to gaming, the expected drop and then unexpected, dramatic rise in profits, the photographs of his brother giving his first lone addresses to the press.

"Nii-sama, what are you doing?"

"I'm just refreshing my memory."

"I mean... Nii-sama, Isono said you'd cancelled Battle City. That's not true, right?" When he got no immediate answer Mokuba grabbed the free chair and pulled it close to his brother, sitting in it and trying to force Seto to look at him, without success. "What's going on? Are you okay? They're charting a course back to the mainland. Shouldn't I go tell them to fly back to Alcatraz?"

"That won't be necessary, Mokuba. We're already on course."

"To Alcatraz?"

"To the mainland."

"But what about the tournament?" Mokuba could hear the embarrassing, broken pitch in his voice. The confusion was boiling within him, clouds of fear steaming off it.

"The tournament is a waste of time. Now, if you don't mind, Mokuba, I'm extremely busy."

"A waste of-?" Without even thinking not to, Mokuba slammed his fists down upon the table. He almost fell backwards at the look in his brother's eyes. Black disgust, hatred, a gaze that hadn't met his own in a very long time. "Nii-sama," he said, stumbling over the syllables. "I just... You spent so long planning this, and-"

"I already told you," Seto cut in, his voice a single serrated shard. "I'm busy."

"But-"

In one single smooth, violent movement, Seto stood, grabbed Mokuba's arm, and pulled him from the chair. Mokuba would have fallen if his brother hadn't held him easily aloft in the tight vice of his fingers, dragging him across the room in the wake of his uncompromising strides. Mokuba did nothing to protest. He was roughly, insistently escorted him to the door, which Seto opened, and then shoved him through. Mokuba barely had time to turn and look him in the eye.

"Go play in your own room."

And, with that, the door slid shut in Mokuba's face. He stood staring at the featureless plane of metal for some long, stunned moments.

"...but this  _is_ my room."

* * *

The next several days were spent in the air. Mokuba lost track of time entirely. Away from Japan, sideways, backwards, the sea beneath them, then the land. A stop in China, he and Isono sitting alone in an airport in silent, shared confusion, then back onto another private plane. Seto kept to himself. Mokuba barely even saw him. He and Isono took their instructions from a man Mokuba didn't even know who had inexplicably been appointed Seto's new right hand man, while Isono was demoted to watching Mokuba. And then, after a brief stop in Tokyo, Isono was gone altogether. Mokuba was told he had been sent back to Domino ahead of them, but when he finally arrived back at the Kaiba Corp. HQ, one disorientating morning following several sleepless nights, neither of the two men guarding his brother's office door was Isono, and neither man would allow him entrance.

Mokuba spent most of that morning pacing fruitlessly outside the office door. His feet crossed over again and again the encroaching line of morning sunlight, sliding its way across the carpet towards the opposite wall, leisurely tracking every second that passed in which Mokuba was denied entrance to his only family.

Seto always made time for him. Always. Mokuba understood that Seto needed his space and tried hard not to bother him when he was working, but when Mokuba needed him then Seto was always there.

He hadn't even considered that he wouldn't be allowed in. He had momentarily paused at the sight of the two suited men standing guard outside his brother's door, smartly blocking the entrance to anyone who might approach, but he had quickly shrugged it off. When he had reached out awkwardly around them for the door handle, however, they drew sharply together to cut him off.

Mokuba made a loud, exaggerated sound of disbelief.

"Mister Kaiba's orders, sir," said the first suit. Mokuba didn't even recognise these men. Were they new?

"I don't think those orders extend to me," Mokuba replied, more than a little insulted, and reached out for the door handle again – and, again, was blocked off.

"Mister Kaiba's orders, sir," the man repeated, his intonation identical.

"Are you serious?" Mokuba drew himself up to his full height, which, admittedly, was less than impressive, and stared down the man who had spoken. "As Vice President of Kaiba Corporation,  _I_  order  _you_  to let me pass."

The two suits exchanged a glance, but neither made any signal that they were intending to move.

"Mister Kaiba," began the other suit, his tone more apologetic, "specifically ordered that you be denied entrance." He threw a sidelong look at his partner, who did not return it. "I'm sorry, sir."

Mokuba made the sound of disbelief once again. He then took several steps backwards, folded his arms, and leaned against the wall opposite in a pose of consummate stubbornness. "Fine. I'll wait."

"He only said we were to bar your entrance for the morning," added the second guard. The first cleared his throat very obviously, a warning to shut up, and then both men fell silent.

Mokuba had maintained his pose until his back began to burn with the discomfort and then took to his present pacing, glaring all the while at that patch of sunlight, trying to reason away his brother's strange behaviour. It had only been getting stranger since the Virtual World. It was as if he had seen something there, as if something had got inside him; infected him, somehow. The press were still waiting for an official line explaining why Battle City had been so abruptly cancelled, which Mokuba couldn't give to them because he didn't have the faintest idea. Rumours abounded, of course. Disastrous technical failure? Possible. Fear of losing against Yuugi? No. The piece of gossip that the ruins of Alcatraz contained a live nuke that Seto had accidentally primed? Ridiculous.

A little, niggling part of him chastised himself for mocking those who spread the rumours. After all, those people were just the public. How were they supposed to know better, when Mokuba, Seto's brother, his only living kin, had absolutely no idea?

"Nii-sama..." Mokuba breathed inaudibly, staring at the patch of bright, burning light that marked the approach of midday. Closer, closer... What was happening? What on earth was happening?

Something loud and static buzzed and Mokuba jumped. The first suit twitched the wire that looped his ear between his fingers, inclining his head to listen, Mokuba assumed, to something being spoken from his earpierce.

The man released the wire then looked to Mokuba. "You can go in now, sir."

Mokuba forgot about appearances entirely as he let out a loud sigh of relief and half ran towards the door to his brother's office. He had forgotten about his brother's cold behaviour on the plane. He just wanted to hold him, to be comforted, to feel the familiar heartbeat pressed against his own. The second suit stood back and opened the door for him, flashing what might have been a genial smile, but Mokuba wasn't paying attention. He pushed past the two men, heart swelling up into his throat. His ears were faintly ringing and his skin crawling like something alive was burying out of him. Why was he panicking? There was nothing to worry about; everything was fine. His brother was fine. Everything was fine. Why did he feel like he was going to throw up?

The office looked almost the same: clean, bright, the desk was a mess – that was unusual – but otherwise everything was familiar.

Except his nii-sama.

Seto always sat so  _straight_ , Mokuba suddenly realised. He had never paid it much attention before, but it was true. If there was one thing consistent in his brother's posture it was that fine, straight back, always so smart and attentive, a model of self-discipline and efficiency. Mokuba had seen his brother fall asleep at his desk, yes, and then his fine posture folded up into exhaustion, and Mokuba had seen him momentarily lean back from his desk to roll his stiff neck and stretch his arms, but Mokuba had never seen him  _lounge_. He had never seen his brother, as he sat now, fully reclined in his chair, legs crossed upon the table, one hand behind his head, and the other hand – no, never this,  _never_ this – holding a thick, smoke-pouring cigar.

The figure of his brother did not address him. He looked at the cigar as if it held more interest to him than Mokuba ever possibly could, an expression Mokuba had seen a thousand times before on the face of a dead man he had once called father. When the man spoke his cadence was, yes, that of his brother, yet not his, somehow uncanny, like his voice had been shaken out like a sheet and left ugly and crinkled.

"Mokuba," he said, and it wasn't him. It wasn't his brother. "I have a proposition for you."

And then Mokuba knew. And by then it was too late.


	2. Acclimatization

MAY 22nd

Mokuba didn't eat breakfast any more. Lunch too usually went ignored, but sometimes he managed a sparse supper after sunset. Just enough to keep going. It helped with the nausea if he ate less and, besides, he never had much of an appetite these days. He still came down every morning at breakfast, though, just as he used to do, and then he would sit at the shining breakfast station and wait to be served the first meal of the day. Today it was eggs, though the smell of them and the thought of their grey, viscous bodies upon the plates made acid rise in his throat. Seto hated eggs.

He kept his eyes low and fixed hard on the cutlery before him when he heard the familiar sound of his brother's light footsteps approaching. Every morning they sounded like a little warning bell. Mokuba refused to look up even when the man pretending to be his brother sat directly opposite him.

"Good morning, Mokuba," Gozaburo said, needing to nod at the maid before she served the two plates. She was new. The staff had to be changed, of course. So many things needed gutting. He reached for the newspaper that had been laid out for him, flicking to the business section so comfortably it was as though this had been his routine for years. He noticed that Mokuba was still not looking at him. "Did you sleep well?"

"Yes, nii-sama," Mokuba muttered in a dead monotone and remained staring at his breakfast, watching it. It isn't nii-sama. It looks like him, and it smells like him, and there's a certain echo of Seto's smile and his laugh and his curling disdain, but it isn't him. Mokuba forced himself to pick up the cutlery, each piece of metal feeling like it was made of lead. He slowly began to cut up food which he didn't intend to eat and played make believe. "Are you going to the office today?"

"Of course, why wouldn't I?"

Mokuba indulged a cold smirk. "Term's starting. You have to attend school at least two days a week."

Gozaburo sighed exasperatedly, then broke into a grin. "Well, why not?" He ran his tongue between his teeth in a way that Seto would never, ever do. "High school girls, you know."

Mokuba dropped his smirk. It hadn't brought him much amusement, anyway. He returned to his breakfast, staring hard at the tiny grits of matter in the sauce, at the single particles of breadcrumb. He cut it up and slid it around, clearing space, occasionally lifting something to his lips then recoiling from the smell and replacing it. The passing observer might mistake it for eating.

"Can I go to the basement now?" he asked dully.

Gozaburo glanced at his overpriced watch and twitched his eyebrows incredulously. "You're leaving for school in ten minutes."

"Just for ten minutes, then," Mokuba replied in that same monotone. "I'm already ready to leave."

Gozaburo shrugged. He didn't care. He wasn't here to be a father or a brother to this boy; this was all play acting. The boy was just a prop, one without which he could not play the role of Kaiba Seto without raising suspicion. Mokuba knew this, and he knew he wouldn't be necessary forever.

Strangely, it didn't seem to concern him.

When the maids cleaned the table they were quite convinced by Mokuba's disturbed plate that he had eaten a hearty breakfast.

* * *

Mokuba had never explicitly been forbidden entrance to the basement but he had always instinctively avoided the hive of locked doors and inexplicable dead ends that ran rampant beneath the Kaiba Mansion. He knew what kind of secrets this family kept and they were far more dangerous than the monsters of his nightmares.

Mokuba remembered that fear with something like nostalgia as he made his way down the basement steps, submerging himself into darkness and a thick, subterranean smell. However much this labyrinth used to frighten him, it no longer mattered. The Minotaur was already loose. Nothing to be afraid of down here now, only silence and wires and, humming through the dead air, a whine of electricity. The high note filled Mokuba's head in what could almost be interpreted as an inarticulate welcome. It sent a wonderful, horrible shiver down his spine.

Mokuba picked his way past discarded furniture and pushed through swathes of dust, making swift progress to the only door that interested him. He could walk this route blindfolded by now.

The door itself had a single, unusual looking lock set into its wide metal face, but Mokuba had the key.  _A_ key at least. There were, of course, two, though where Gozaburo kept the second Mokuba did not know. He turned his own in the lock and eased his weight onto the heavy metal face, pushing it silently open on freshly oiled hinges. Mokuba's eyes widened in the gloom beyond, blinking at the harsh glow of an old CRT monitor. There was no light switch in here. No light bulb, for that matter.

The computer was a big white plastic thing with an overspill of wires clustered around a small, corrupted screen. The colours didn't show right and dead pixels littered it, but that didn't matter to Mokuba. What mattered was the single primitive text program that had been left open on the dying monitor. A program that was always open.

Mokuba stumbled towards the stool and clumsily pulled on the pair of headphones as he slid into it, his eyes heating and throat tightening before the microphone was even positioned before his mouth.

"Hey, nii-sama."

Something deep inside the ancient machine gave a heavy, laborious whirr as wires and electric neurons heated up.

And then a reply appeared in big, quivering white capitals on a black background: HEY KIDDO.

Mokuba's heart jumped. "Miss you," he said redundantly and the reply instantly appeared, far faster than human fingers could type.

ARE YOU BACK FROM SCHOOL?

Seto doesn't have a sense of time, not really, not where he is. He isn't anywhere. No one's typing these messages.

"I haven't gone yet," Mokuba said, sniffing and swallowing and trying to smooth his quivering voice. "I only have a few minutes." He could hear the crack in his voice and see humiliating tears blur his vision. "He's wearing that tie you hate."

LET'S NOT TALK ABOUT HIM, came the immediate reply. DID YOU EAT BREAKFAST?

"Yes," Mokuba lied.

YOU KNOW I CAN TELL YOU'RE LYING. I DON'T WANT YOU TO GET SICK.

"I'm already sick." The time was ticking away so fast; so, so fast. Ten tiny minutes in which he wouldn't be totally alone. "Everything is so sick right now."

THAT DOESN'T MATTER AS LONG AS YOU'RE WELL. I'D FEEL MUCH BETTER IF I KNEW YOU WERE EATING PROPERLY.

Although he didn't say anything, Mokuba once again couldn't help but wonder if Seto really could  _feel_ any more. Noa could feel, but Noa had a virtual body and virtual guts and virtual ice cream stands. Seto was messages on a text editor. There was no pale simulacrum of reality inside that dying harddrive. Sometimes the messages don't come out quite right, as though Seto was thinking out loud, but Mokuba didn't know if there was a difference between thinking and saying for Seto any more. He didn't dare ask. He tried to delude himself into believing that everything was normal. He pretended this was IRC and Seto was simply away on a business trip. Playing make believe.

MOKUBA? I DON'T ARE YOU?

"I'm here," Mokuba said quickly, looking away from the nonsense sentence. Seto was never able to tell if a few seconds had passed or a few hours. Sometimes he forgot that Mokuba was there in the middle of a conversation. "I was just thinking. How are you?"

Mokuba immediately regretted asking as more of those little broken sentences appeared: I'M. AM JUST. I I. HOW ARE YOU?

"Pretty awful," Mokuba hurried to answer, trying to ground the conversation. The computer tower made several loud, disconcerting noises. Avoid abstract topics. "Mostly I'm nauseous." He felt his physicality so strongly that it burned. He wondered if Seto could remember nausea, if he could remember any feelings, or if to him the word was just an empty signifier. But how dare he make his brother worry – if he even  _can_  worry – about nausea and headaches and nightmares, when these are all things that Seto will never feel again? "It's not so bad. It's better than it was yesterday. I think I'm getting better."

Can Seto actually hear him? How does he register this information? Can he distinguish inflections, tone, the imperfections in his brother's adolescent pitch or the shape of his laugh?

GO TO THE DOCTOR. I KNOW IT'S A DIFFICULT TIME BUT YOU NEED TO TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF. I WANT TO SEE YOU GROW UP HEALTHY.

Black and ice fell through Mokuba's stomach. The thought of Seto seeing him grow up. The thought of years like this. Gozaburo playing the part of his son like it was a game and Seto existing as a mess of fractured thoughts and memories on a single scratched disc.

"I love you, nii-sama," he said, simply for something to say, simply to say it. "I will help you. I'll find a way to fix this."

DON'T WORRY ABOUT ME. I JUST WANT YOU TO BE WELL. DON'T YOU DARE PUT YOURSELF IN ANY DANGER FOR MY SAKE.

"But it's for my sake too," Mokuba said, dimly realising his voice had broken into sobs. "I can't keep going without you."

I'M HERE. I'M ALWAYS HERE. MOKUBA?

"Nii-sama?"

ARE YOU BACK FROM SCHOOL?

"I haven't left yet," Mokuba said, then tried to force the conversation into a temporal structure his brother could understand. "It's still morning. It's a really nice day." He had no idea what kind of day it was, but if Seto couldn't see the sun then what did it matter if Mokuba could? It can be a nice day if Mokuba wants it to be. "The sky's completely blue," he lied, "and most of the flowers are out. We should be blowing off school and hanging out in the garden."

IS IT STILL SPRING?

Panic jabbed at Mokuba's chest. "Of course it is. Only a few weeks have passed," he said steadily. "Three weeks and two days exactly."

SEEMS LONGER.

"How..." Mokuba chose his words carefully. "How long does it seem to you, since you've been in there?"

The seconds ticked past and no text appeared. The black screen throbbed against his blurred, stinging vision and the panic rose again, burning through him at the constant threat that the program might spew out gibberish. Or, worse, that the reply wouldn't come, would never come, that the computer would become a mute prison for someone who might not even exist any more.

But the reply came at last: SINCE ALWAYS. SINCE SINCE SINCE SINCE...

"It's not been always." Mokuba's eyes flickered over the endlessly repeating words. "I promise you, it hasn't." The word continued to repeat,  _SINCE SINCE SINCE_ , and Mokuba took up a pencil lying beside the keyboard and jotted the word down on the notepad that lay there, one among many words and phrases that seemed to glitch his brother's programming:  _how are you, do you remember, imagination_. 'Since' is another he will remember not to say.

The word finally stopped repeating.

"Nii-sama?"

Not even the briefest pause: ARE YOU BACK FROM SCHOOL?

* * *

The Spring sky was indeed a pure, incandescent blue, but Mokuba didn't notice it. He sat mutely in the centre of the limousine's empty back seats and stared out at the grey blur of the streets passing him by, not really seeing anything. The driver was new and didn't speak to him, just like the rest of Gozaburo's new recruits. Isono used to be the one who drove him to school, and if Seto wasn't with them then Isono would keep Mokuba entertained with light, friendly conversation about his studies and Seto's work.

Where was Isono now? Still alive? Was he worried about them, or was he being paid to worry about someone else now?

His lips twitching in a weak smile, Mokuba replayed Isono's voice in his head:  _"So, you've got your mathematics test today. Worried?"_

" _No way, maths is easy,"_ Mokuba mouthed the words silently, not willing to disturb the driver.  _"I could be top of the class with my eyes closed."_

" _Why not be on the safe side and keep your eyes open, hm, Master Mokuba?"_

Mokuba tried to mouth the next words, but he couldn't remember what he had said in reply to that. Perhaps he had laughed. It had been a long time since he laughed. It didn't matter. That memory was months old and there were no tests today. Or were there? The approach of the new school term had barely registered for him these past three weeks. Mokuba supposed that he should try to get good grades, for Seto's sake, but the fact that Seto wouldn't be around to see him graduate dulled the motivation.

And after school, what then? Gozaburo would never permit him to work at KaibaCorp. in anything but a symbolic capacity, but he wasn't going to allow him to get a normal job either. College was out of the question. Gozaburo would want to keep him in his sights as much as possible. Of course, this was assuming that Gozaburo would keep him around into his college years.

_Perhaps I won't even have time to graduate high school. Wonder when my expiry date is._

How would he do it? Drugs, suffocation? Pay someone to stage an abduction? Would he draw it out, have them forge a ransom note, send out a little tape of Mokuba bound and beaten and begging for his life to reinforce the charade?

Mokuba knew the rules of this old game and it wouldn't be the first time the Kaiba family had played it. The ransom would comprise the assassin's pay cheque, the assassin would send out a message saying that the kid knew too much and it was too much of a risk, and then Mokuba's body would be discovered several days later washed up by the riverside, swollen with water, disfigured. Effective, efficient. The sympathy for the grieving CEO would doubtlessly spike Kaiba Corp.'s profits and Mokuba would finally prove useful to his foster father.

Mokuba drew his knees up to his chest and rested his chin there, trying to quash the sharp pain in his chest. Strange that his first instinct was to run to his brother's arms, regardless of who those arms belonged to now. A warm embrace was so much more comforting than a computer screen, even if that embrace would be broken by a revolted shove, maybe a slap. If only to smell his brother's skin...

Maybe Gozaburo would just do it himself. Mokuba preferred the idea of a quiet, drugged death in his brother's arms to some clumsy, undignified murder in a storage container somewhere. Gozaburo could be merciful, sometimes. He could make it easier. Maybe it wouldn't hurt.

And what would he tell Seto? Anything? Or would he simply leave the computer running indefinitely? Would Seto, with his wrecked sense of time, not know how long that Mokuba had been gone? Would he wait, and wait for years, for his brother to return from school? Mokuba didn't know. It didn't seem like he knew much of anything any more. His brother had lost a duel against his dead foster father and had had his mind ripped from his body, burned into a mess of copper, and encased in plastic. Now a dead man was walking around in his skin. Everything he knew had long since fallen away, disintegrated, leaving Mokuba standing alone, buffeted by nonsense, lost amongst the tides.

* * *

School was too loud and too bright. Mokuba walked silently among his fellow students with his arms drawn to his chest, isolated and cold inside, not quite able to believe that any of these kids could really be people with their own individual, meaningful lives. He couldn't relate to anything. The rest of the students might as well have been leaves in the wind.

It was still slightly better than the office, Mokuba supposed. At least at home he could lock himself in his room and pretend everything was normal, but Kaiba Corp. had quickly been subsumed into Gozaburo's renovations. There were traces of him everywhere, building up relentlessly as he carved his way back into his old life. At school, at least, there was some comfort offered by the fact that the normal world believed Gozaburo was dead. Not much comfort, but it was enough to pretend, if only for a little while.

Mokuba wandered his way to class without hearing the late bell go. He didn't even notice the teacher's absence when he arrived at the classroom. The students had the television on, tuned to the news channel, but no one was paying it any attention. They were all clustered in their usual groups, but most looked up when Mokuba entered. The room's chatter quickly faded into barbed silence as a room full of eyes fixed upon him, every gaze cold and accusatory. Mokuba halted in the doorway, confused. For one brief moment he forgot about Gozaburo and his brother and the wreck that his life had become, completely perplexed, but then he realised why they were looking at him like that.

_Battle City's cancellation. Right._

As if that mattered to him now. He shrugged his bag off his shoulders and ignored the atmosphere, forcing his way unceremoniously past the two groups by the door. Several of the students he pushed past threw him unpleasant looks, and two girls deliberately turned their chairs away.

Mokuba dropped his bag to the floor and sat at a lone chair near the television. He stared at it blankly, watching a jumble of semi-famous faces cycle through the screen. So odd to think he used to care about these things; not much, but he did care. It was all nonsense now.

And then his chest sharply contracted as Seto – the  _real_ Seto – appeared. It was footage of the Battle City announcement, his nii-sama as tall and proud and strong as ever, but the words he was shouting were drowned out by the reporting voice over.

"Kaiba Corporation has announced that it will be entering negotiations with Mizu Electronics to integrate the SolidVision software into other virtual reality products. SolidVision has, until now, been under exclusive use of the Duel Monsters Accessories franchise, licensed by Kaiba Corporation, but the company is now seeking to expand its use for the ground-breaking technology..."

Mokuba drifted out. Little by little all of Seto's Duel Monsters tech would be eaten up into other enterprises and the company would slough everything that Seto had worked for these past years. Gozaburo wouldn't go back to weapons manufacture; that was both too difficult and not sufficiently profitable. He would likely set about maximising the profitability of SolidVision and monopolise the market with it. He wasn't an inventor, he was a businessman. Without Seto, SolidVision was likely the last real innovation KaibaCorp. would produce, but Mokuba doubted Gozaburo would need anything more. There was a lot of profit to be spun out of SolidVision by someone who knew what they were doing.

"Kaiba.  _Kaiba._ " Someone thumped his shoulder. "I'm talking to you, Kaiba."

Dragging his disinterested attention from the news report, Mokuba turned slowly to see Kunimura, a boy he barely knew but who famously bore a thin, shallow scar across his face. Up close the wound did not seem that impressive.

"What." The word was barely a question.

"'What'? That's all you got, Kaiba?" Three of Kunimura's friends sat around him, each grinning identical secret, sadistic grins at Mokuba. Mokuba wondered if they knew the sort of gangs he ran with before Seto's coma, all those long months ago. The detached, floating image passed through Mokuba's head of slitting each of their throats. "I'll tell you 'what', Kaiba, is that I had two fifty thousand yen running on that Jounouchi Katsuya to make it to the semi finals. And you know what's happened to my money now?"

 _Yes._ "No."

"The bookie is keeping every penny of it, that's what. They've made a tidy profit off all the less than legal bets that they don't have to reimburse, which obviously includes all those made by those of us who are underage."

Mokuba only stared. "Not my problem," he said flatly, and tried to turn back around, but Kunimura's hand grabbed his shirt.

"Yeah, I think it is your problem," he breathed. "Not that you'd know what it's like to have to work for a living, but the rest of us actually understand the value of money. Battle City's cancellation has burned a hole in everyone's pocket, and someone has to pay." He leaned closer, and Mokuba saw one of the other boys slip a penknife from his pocket. "If your coward of a brother hadn't gotten cold feet about facing off against Mutou, then perhaps-"

Then Mokuba snapped.

For a moment he lost all sense of time and place. Continuity shattered and then reformed a dozen or so seconds later. When his consciousness resurfaced, he realised he was being restrained at the waist by a woman, Ms Aoyama, and that Kunimura was lying on the floor with a face covered in blood. The teacher was shouting; a cacophony of braying students surrounded them. Mokuba was unharmed. The other kid must have put the knife away the moment he saw the teacher enter the room.

Mokuba fell half limp and the teacher released him, dropping to her knees and then turning him to face her.

"Mokuba, what are you  _doing?_ " she said, face full of anger, confusion, and worry. "What is wrong with you? Did Kunimura try to hurt you?"

She asked what seemed like a hundred other things, some of which Mokuba made the effort to answer, and after what seemed an unnecessarily long time he was conducted to the principal's office and given a week's suspension.

He walked the five mile journey home.

* * *

Three messages had been left for Mokuba on the family answering machine when he got home. He listened to seven seconds of the first, then deleted all of them.

"Hey, Mokuba, it's Yuugi. Listen, can you please get Kaiba to call me? I know something big must be up, but-"

He jabbed a red button.

" _You have no new messages_ ," intoned the machine.

It was better this way. Perhaps it was only a matter of time before Gozaburo began to work through the list of those who knew about the Virtual World. Mai, Rishid, and Bakura still lay comatose, but maybe that would keep them safe. As for Yuugi and the others, well, maybe their days were numbered, maybe they weren't. Gozaburo wouldn't tell him, and asking would only put them in further danger. And what about Malik? What about-

Mokuba started as the phone suddenly rang. He read the name of the caller ID several times, then carefully lifted the receiver off the hook. He held it suspended there, listening intently.

"Hello? Master Seto? Are you there?"

Warmth flooded him at the familiar voice and he continued to listen for a moment longer, hoping to hear Isono's voice sound again. He felt the security cameras burning into his back as he listened, every second a risk, then gently eased the phone back down with a click. It didn't matter. Simply to hear a few seconds of a friendly voice would be enough to get him through the week. Maybe Isono would call again. Mokuba couldn't talk to him, of course, but it would be nice to know someone was thinking of him.

As he walked away the phone began to ring again. The security cameras continued to stare mutely down upon him, and this time Mokuba ignored it.

* * *

When Mokuba wandered aimlessly into the kitchen, he saw that there was a fire burning in the garden. He stopped for a moment, staring out at it and the tall figure silhouetted against the flames, then redirected his slow footsteps to the back door. If there was one thing that ran in the Kaiba family, lack of blood relation aside, it seemed to be a flair for the melodramatic.

The fire raged freely beneath the hot sun, almost eight feet high at its peak, and gave off a low rumble as it contentedly ate up some broken furniture, vast parcels of papers, and what looked like a great deal of clothing. As Mokuba neared he identified the exotic coats, the subtle black turtle necks, and the other familiar items of Seto's wardrobe. The light stung his eyes but he kept his gaze fixed on the centre of the inferno as he approached, his body hot with dread.

He came to stand next to the figure of his brother and folded his arms tightly to stop himself shivering, despite the roaring heat. "What are you doing?"

"Cleaning up."

"It looks suspiciously like wanton destruction," Mokuba said, cracking a smile, and glanced up at his brother. His smile immediately dropped at the alien expression looking back at him. Pretending made it easier, but make believe for one was no fun.

"Some things need to be destroyed," Gozaburo answered levelly, his tones paced and accented so slightly differently from Seto. "Shredding doesn't quite have the same effect."

"Fire cleanses," Mokuba murmured. The man beside him snorted.

"How original of you."

"I'm just saying." Mokuba stared hard at a crumbling book, though what its title read he couldn't tell. He didn't feel rebellious, he simply felt too exhausted to care. "If I was going to kill myself, it'd be fire. I wouldn't take an easy way out."

There was no one in earshot to hear the slap fall, and it rang eerily about the empty grounds. Mokuba half fell, clutching his throbbing ear as a band of pain erupted along his face and burst within his mouth.

"Either you can treat me like your respected elder,  _little brother_ , or I can take away the many privileges I have afforded you," Gozaburo discoursed leisurely. "It will be easier for both of us if you make this transition as smooth as possible." He breathed in satisfactorily, surveying the flames, then continued to talk as if selflessly bestowing upon Mokuba a valuable life lesson. "It's highly unlikely that the world at large will ever discover that the real Seto is dead, but that's no reason not to take precautions. If you like, I can keep you locked in your room and chained to the wall and only take you out for press events. I will treat you like the same crawling dog I made out of your brother." His eyes stayed staring into the fire all the while as he spoke, the blue eclipsed by writhing yellows and blacks. "It's your choice."

Mokuba remained half bent to the floor, one hand supporting himself against the grass. He swallowed twice, then spat bloodily. "He's not," he forced out.

Gozaburo's eyes flicked away from the fire. "Not what?

" _Not_.  _Dead_."

Gozaburo grinned, then turned back to the blaze and pulled something small from his pocket. "Not yet. Give it time." When he held the object up to the sun, Mokuba saw what it was. There was no mistaking the mock Duel Monsters design of his brother's locket. His own lay safely hidden beneath his shirt, pressed against his skin. Seto's locket glittered in the sunlight as Gozaburo turned it from side to side. "Data degenerates, little brother."

"Don't you dare call me that."

"Oh, I'll call you what I like," he answered idly, as though this conversation was barely worth his attention. Then he tossed the locket into the fire. "You will call me 'nii-sama', or I will shut you away. Away from the sun, away from your school, and away from your brother. Or what's left of him." Finally he turned to look at the boy that used to be his son, if only on paper, and gave him a smile that Mokuba wished, so desperately wished, didn't look so familiar. "Do you think he would notice if I pretended to be you, hm? If I told him that he had betrayed you, that you no longer loved him, that you blamed him for your first father's death? You think he'd be able to tell the difference?"

Mokuba only stared, and Gozaburo shrugged.

"I'd get bored. Hitting the delete button would be so much more efficient."

Mokuba didn't watch him walk away. His attention was focused on the locket. The cord had quickly began to burn away but the metal casing was well made and remained solid against the flames, shifting a little as the books it had fallen upon began to dissolve into ash. It was so close, just within arm's reach.

_Could he?_

The pain felt as though it flashed right through to the bone. Mokuba swore loudly as he retracted his hand, cursing as he pulled his school jacket off and threw it to the ground, leaving it there to burn. Did he really just  _forget_ that the fire would catch him?

He turned his attention back to the fire. He now stood at a slightly different angle, and when his gaze found the locket his breath caught. It had slipped open on impact. He didn't need to look closer to know that the photograph inside would already be destroyed.

It didn't matter. They had copies of that photo, plus digital copies online. Providing, of course, that Gozaburo hadn't deleted them. Mokuba had already given up all the passwords. Seto wouldn't have, but Mokuba wasn't strong like that. He held out well for an hour, but once Gozaburo got the pliers out he lost the fight quite rapidly. Worse than the pain he remembered the look on his face, and how that look was not so dissimilar to expressions he'd seen on Seto's face when his body used to be his own.

As Mokuba watched the paint of the locket finally start to degrade in the fire, his gaze drifted to a black crumple at his feet which was only smoking very slightly. He grabbed it immediately and stepped away from the fire, looking wildly around for anything else that might have escaped the blaze, but nothing else seemed to remain whole save parts of Seto's personal furniture. Ergonomic chairs, chrome tables, all in his favourite, efficient styles. Soon it would all be replaced with the archaic finery that Gozaburo had been so fond of.

Clutching the black thing, it took Mokuba several crazy seconds to ascertain that it was indeed a shirt, one of many identical turtlenecks Seto once owned, but which was now the only one left. He put it to his face and breathed deeply, hoping for the old smell of his brother. It mostly smelt of smoke, but  _Seto_ was still there. He immediately wished he hadn't done that. He had thought the scent would trigger some bright memory in him, something from before that would overwrite how things were now, but he realised that it really didn't smell so different than his brother's body did now. Overlain with cigars and whisky though it was, Seto's body still smelt of itself.

He drew the shirt away. What had he expected? Confirmation that it wasn't  _really_ Seto's body that his dead foster father wore? Ridiculous.

He kept the shirt anyway, folding it and sliding it under his own scorched shirt. He just wanted to keep a little piece of who his brother used to be. Just a little piece. There was so little left.

* * *

It seemed a very long walk back into the house. Mokuba dragged his feet, unable to quite put his finger on why he was procrastinating. Every inch of his being was begging him not to go down into the basement once again. Being in the mansion was hard, being with Gozaburo was hard, but being in that room with that computer was somehow the best and worst place he could be.

Mokuba tried to push the thoughts to the back of his mind but they were still scratching at his skull even when he reached the door to the basement. He slid the key into the lock with a dull crunch, and then he paused. His palm hovered over the door handle, ready to grasp it, and still he paused. Behind that door lay the long and winding path to his brother, to the only family he had left. All he had to do was turn the key, open the door, and he would be on that path, creeping his way through the mansion's forgotten insides to the room that kept the remnants of his brother intact. He only had to open the door.

Yet part of him didn't want to. A shameful, ardent part of him wanted to go back to his room and hide beneath the covers where he could curl up to sleep with his dead brother's shirt. He could remember how his brother used to be and perhaps try to deceive himself into believing he was still alive, still here, with him.

But Seto wasn't dead. Seto was alive and conscious and the man who wore his smile  _wasn't him_. Even if Gozaburo took inexplicable pity on Mokuba and played the role of Kaiba Seto to the best of his ability every moment of every day then he still wouldn't achieve even a vague approximation of a  _shadow_  of his brother.

His heart beating a hole through his chest, a dreadful ache tunnelling through him, Mokuba twisted the heavy key and leaned all his weight onto the door until it swung slowly open. He paused for a moment, thinking of the warmth of his bed and the smile of the man who wasn't his brother. Then he thought of the computer downstairs and that endless repeating inquiry that he could finally answer. He let the door close and began to descend the stairs once more. Yes, he was back from school.


	3. Atrophy

JUNE 11th

This was the second press conference since it happened. It didn't seem possible to Mokuba that it could already the second time. Surely it was only a few days ago that it was his brother at his side, his real brother, making the Battle City announcements? But, no. It had happened before, and it would happen again. It helped to register the 'first times' of the things Gozaburo did in the guise of Seto: the first time he and Mokuba sat at breakfast together, the first time they visited the KaibaCorp. HQ, the first time Mokuba found himself hungry enough to come down to eat dinner with him. It helped stress the newness, how unnatural it was, to continually register these little differences, as though every instance was a fresh intrusion upon Seto's life. But as the breakfasts turned into part of a daily routine and Mokuba found himself more often than not accompanying the man to the office, simply for something to do, those virgin intrusions became less like ugly black smears on Seto's life and more scarlike, traced over and over again, steadily inscribing permanence.

The first conference, two weeks ago, had been to announce the official reasons for the cancellation of Battle City. The press easily ate up the spin about a virus whose contagiousness prompted KaibaCorp. to shut the entire tournament down once three of the finalists had fallen into comas. That neatly explained away Bakura, Mai, and Rishid's conditions, while highlighting KaibaCorp.'s image as a compassionate company with its customers best interests at heart. Mokuba had to fight not to roll his eyes as the press applauded.

This second conference would focus on the company's shift in focus towards virtual reality and holograms and away from children's games, and Mokuba did not want to be here. The room was crammed with journalists, at least half of whom did not have an official invitation and stood in unprofessional crushes at the sides of the room. One might think this meant that security was lax, but Gozaburo had wanted this. Orchestrated chaos. It certainly made an impression.

Mokuba sat smartly, his chair drawn some distance back from the table. He wasn't required to answer questions. He surveyed the rabble in silence, resentment swirling within him. He never used to mind them the press much. In a strange way, press conferences reminded him of being at the orphanage. He would shrug on his brightest smile and the wannabe foster parents would act as though he was spotlighted in sunshine. He loved the attention, the warmth, how for a few moments a friendless orphan kid could be the centre of the world.

Seto always felt differently.

"And this is my nii-sama," little childhood Mokuba would chirrup, completely and naively blind to his brother's cold, stony eyes, his inward drawn composure, the way he refused to smile at anybody who took an interest in his little brother. Like he had problems. Like there was something  _wrong_ with him.

The parents would usually offer him a "hello" and a "So what's your name, young man?" If Mokuba was lucky they might crack an awkward joke about what a serious young man Seto was, but Seto simply stared, arms folded, challenging,  _daring_ them to say another word to his little brother. And then they would drift away, and Mokuba would be left alone, his spirits only gently crushed. It never mattered for long. Seto would take his hand and off him a smile, a real smile, and Mokuba's doubts would melt away and the two of them would go off together, alone, their own private paradise that no one would ever be able to breach.

On reflection, perhaps Seto knew exactly what he was doing in driving off the parents who took interest in them.

Press conferences had been the same act, only to different ends. Mokuba would take the microphone and grin and beam and flash the audience the perfect image of joyful, boyish enthusiasm. Meanwhile Seto would glower and smirk and act as though the audience ought to be kissing his feet simply for the privilege of standing in his presence, but it no longer drove anybody away. No, now that he stood tall and mature and attractive the press went absolutely insane over it.  _"The formidable Kaiba Seto..." "The inimitable teen billionaire..."_ It got a little tiring.

Different now, of course. So different.

Mokuba didn't grab the microphone. Didn't smile. He sat as quietly and obediently as he knew how in the shadow of the man who wasn't his brother and stayed silent as a seemingly endless hail of questions was delivered. Still, he tried to force himself out of his reverie and pay attention, in case something actually useful to him was said. From the sea of shouting journalists with raised hands, a suited woman with a long notebook and earpiece received a nod and quickly stood to ask her question.

"Mister Kaiba, this will be the second time in three years that Kaiba Corporation has dramatically changed its direction. Aren't you concerned about how dropping the Duel Monsters franchise might affect your already shaky financial standing?"

 _Ha, shaky,_ Mokuba thought and, without considering, leaned towards the microphone and cut off Gozaburo before he had a chance to speak.

"Kaiba Corporation has been more profitable manufacturing products for the Duel Monsters franchise than it used to be even at its height of weapons manufacture," he announced quickly and enthusiastically, then immediately had the microphone tilted away from him.

"Unlike our previous shift in direction, Kaiba Corporation will not be starting with a blank slate," Gozaburo said smartly, not even throwing Mokuba a single warning glance under the eyes of the dozens of cameras. "We are simply going to expand our virtual technology beyond the constraints of the gaming industry while shifting our focus from-" He paused infinitesimally. "-children's games. This shall mark a broadening of our horizons, not a narrowing of them."

A swarm of shouts flowed into the brief silence left by his words, several journalists standing in an effort to have their questions chosen. A short, slickly-haired man else received a nod and he fought to shout over the clamour around him.

"Mister Kaiba, was this change in direction prompted by the failure of the Battle City tournament and your subsequent inability to win back the Duel Monsters title from Mutou Yuugi?"

The shouting that followed this was almost deafening.

Gozaburo neatly tilted the microphone towards him and gave the crowd a genial smile. "No further questions."

* * *

Mokuba gave the swarm of flashing cameras a few cursory, wan smiles before allowing his face to fall into its usual empty, faraway expression. He tarried by the limo door and waited for Gozaburo to finish posturing, watching the cameras watch him, wondering if a single photographer would ever notice that they were fawning over the wrong Kaiba.

"Mokuba! Mokuba!"

They didn't usually call his name. Seto's, sure, but not his. The word was clear but distant, shouted audibly even within the clamour, and there was an odd ring of familiarity about it. Mokuba's eyes distractedly roamed the crowd, trying to see who was calling to him, and he gave a start when his gaze alighted on a pair of bright, violet eyes, staring out at him from the monochrome crowd of subdued suits and shades of black.

_Yuugi..._

Those eyes were wide and desperate and Yuugi's lips were indeed clearly mouthing his name, though quieter now that Mokuba had seen him. Was he in trouble? Did he think Mokuba was in trouble? Yuugi was quite a way back in the crowd, trying and failing to fight his way to the front through the hoards of journalists. Mokuba watched him struggle, oddly transfixed, but soon he regained his rationality and sharply turned his back.  _No._  He couldn't risk meeting with Yuugi, and even if he could this was certainly not the place, with a thousand cameras on them and Gozaburo mere inches away.

Mokuba's body jolted as a warm, familiar hand gripped his shoulder.  _Speak of the devil._  He concentrated all his energies on not flinching as Gozaburo drew him close, pivoting him as they turned to face each angle of the encircling cameras. More camera flashes rained upon them and Mokuba tried to force a smile, willing himself to play the role of dutiful little brother. His stomach churned as Gozaburo's fingers gripped him, but within the rolling nausea there flashed a warm twinge of familiarity.

 _Nii-sama is hugging me,_ the wild, desperate part of his brain sounded, and Mokuba tried to zero in on that, pleading with himself to believe it, just for a moment.

He raised his shaking arm and slipped it around his brother's torso, holding it the way he would if Seto still inhabited it. He felt the body stiffen against his side for an instant, though if it was from surprise, irritation, or genuine disgust Mokuba didn't know, and then the hand encircled him tighter and returned the embrace – although the grip on his arm was tight enough to bruise. They paused like that for a moment, the perfect image of brotherly affection, and then the pressure on Mokuba's arm increased to a stinging pitch and he was steered helplessly towards the open limousine door.

Mokuba was pushed firmly inside, but not roughly, thanks to the hundreds of cameras. He slid across the seats into the far corner and pulled down the screen to cover the window, blocking out the eager faces crowding for one last rare shot of the smiling CEO. He felt the seats shift with the weight of his brother's body and then heard the limousine door slam, smartly mutely the overwhelming crowd noise into a muffled drone.

"You talked too much."

Mokuba turned around, though his body and mind protested from exhaustion. He gave his father – brother? what? – a tired, complacent look. "I'm sorry. I won't do it again."

"Children are to be seen and not heard," Gozaburo said distractedly, turning his attention to his cellphone. "That was something your brother mercifully understood."

Mokuba remained silent, though it was more out of weariness than obedience. He watched Gozaburo rapidly hit keys on the phone, entering memorised numbers or who knew what. Mokuba wondered about muscle memory, things that you didn't learn consciously. It was the same brain, wasn't it? Gozaburo hadn't physically extracted anything of Seto's; it was all virtual. Copies of copies. Data. Could there be some part of that person that was still Seto? And, if so, what did that mean for the creature that existed on the computer in the basement? Was that just a mess of algorithms programmed to act like Seto? Could you even copy a person?

_Your brother probably can't even remember what you look like._

"Nii-sama?" Mokuba said abruptly, unable to stop himself before the word was out of his mouth. Well, what would he say instead, anyway? Gozaburo? Dad?

Gozaburo kept his attention focused on the phone for a moment, then he dragged his eyes away to Mokuba. He didn't look particularly angry or irritated. Bored, maybe. Tired. Seto always looked so tired.

"What?"

"I..." What had he intended to say? "Sorry I messed up your press conference," he finished weakly, but with a genuine ring of remorse. But he was putting that on, right? He didn't really care, surely?

Gozaburo stared at him for a long, icy moment. Then he said casually, "It's alright," and returned his attention back to the phone.

And Mokuba, hating himself for it, felt a little bit better.

* * *

Every game that had survived Gozaburo's purge lay in one lopsided pile before the computer in the basement. Chess, checkers, a deck of regular cards, a Rubik's cube, an old game of backgammon with most of the pieces missing, and six Duel Monsters cards. They had slipped down his bedside table where, any other time, they would have lain forgotten. They were the only ones that Gozaburo hadn't burned. Well, all but the Blue Eyes. Mokuba had burned those.

"Throw them into the fire," Gozaburo had said to his, a vicious, lopsided smile cutting through his face as he traced the outline of Mokuba's kneecap with the barrel of a gun. Mokuba had done as he was ordered.

He hadn't told Seto. He couldn't.

Mokuba positioned the microphone over his mouth and spread the games about him in a little crowded half circle.

"Okay," he said brightly. "Got any preferences? We don't have a massive selection. Most of it's been-"  _Burned_. "-put away, but the chess set is good to go, and there's checkers, though I know you hate checkers..."

WE NEED TO TALK, MOKUBA.

Mokuba spared the screen a glance, but pushed on, trying to ignore the quivering electronic text and whatever it might lead to.

"I know you usually kick my butt at chess, but I swear I've been practising," he said rapidly as the guilt ate through him. He shouldn't be taking advantage of his brother's disorientation just to keep the conversation grounded. "I bet I stand a decent chance, and..."

MOKUBA. MOKUBA.

He fell silent despite himself, staring at the words on the screen. The name began to repeat, stuttering, misspelling, the grammar dissolving, but always at the centre Mokuba could make out his name, even as the moniker became hopelessly warped. Was this string of nonsense really more his brother than the living, breathing being upstairs?

Mokuba stared at his fragmented name and recalled Gozaburo's warm arm around his shoulders. Would it be so bad if...

_If what?_

Mokuba felt as though his blood had been replaced with something cold, slimy, oozing.

_If I abandoned my brother?_

He felt like punching himself. He settled instead for viciously biting the side of his mouth. Then he took a sharp breath, one audible over the microphone, and immediately the text stabilised.

MOKUBA ARE YOU?

_Am I what? Here? Okay?_

"I'm here," he breathed, questing his fingers to the screen where light stabs of static momentarily connected him to the same plane as his brother. His real brother, not the  _thing_ upstairs that wore his face and talked like him and could hug him back. "I just zoned out for a moment."

It took a moment for the reply to come. Mokuba wondered if Seto was thinking, but no, Seto didn't think any more, not the way he did.

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT THE PROCESSING ERRORS.

Something heavy and black fell through Mokuba's stomach. "What errors?"

He sat in mute, attentive silence as line after line of technical explanations appeared, well beyond his expertise. Seto knew he didn't understand these things, didn't he? Maybe he'd forgotten.

"Seto," Mokuba interrupted, staring helplessly at a line of text in which he only understood every other word. "Can you simplify?"

Another moment of delay, longer than the first.

NEURAL MAPPING IS ONLY 76% REPLICABLE.

Mokuba's brain worked in overdrive as he tried to translate the message into something he understood. He didn't think about whether or not Seto had a reason for making it difficult for him to understand, or if he was just distracted, or if, maybe, it was easier for a computer to think like a computer.

Something clicked in Mokuba's head. "The computer isn't simulating human thinking properly any more?"

THIS SYSTEM IS TOO BASIC.

Another pause. Even longer this time.

I'VE TRIED TO FIX IT FROM THE INSIDE, BUT THERE'S NOT MUCH I CAN DO.

Mokuba frowned hard, swallowing. His eyes glazed slightly.

"Maybe Gozaburo will let me buy you a better computer. He's not been so bad lately. If I ask nicely, then..."

The text interrupted him mid sentence: NO COMPUTER WOULD BE SUFFICIENTLY POWERFUL.

"Well, we could get a supercomputer. It's not as though we can't afford it. This one was doing fine until..."

Another interruption, as though Seto was hurrying him. But Seto didn't have a sense of time, so...

IT HAS BEEN DEGRADING FOR WEEKS. IT'S JUST BECOMING MORE NOTICEABLE. NO COMPUTER CAN ACCURATELY REPLICATE THE HUMAN BRAIN.

"Noa's computer could. It was KaibaCorp. technology; we must be able to rebuild it."

This time the pause went on so long that Mokuba began counting the seconds.  _One, two, three..._

He fidgeted, wishing he had a watch so he could track time properly. Down here, time passed as inscrutably for him as it did his brother.

_Six, seven..._

WHO'S NOA?

Mokuba stared.

"Noa," Mokuba repeated clearly, wondering if the word hadn't registered correctly. No reply came. "Our step-brother," Mokuba added hesitantly. Still there was no reply. "Gozaburo's son."

The pause went on for at least nine seconds this time. Mokuba was sure he was counting too quickly, that his heart was racing too fast.

I AM GOZABURO'S SON.

"Yeah," Mokuba said cautiously. "So am I. But Noa was his biological son."

I AM SETO KAIBA.

The reply, thankfully, had come quicker this time, but it didn't seem to have any relation to what Mokuba had just said.

"Yeah. Yes, you are," he said, his mind drawing a blank. "And I'm Mokuba."

YOU'RE MY BROTHER.

"And so was Noa," Mokuba finished uselessly, feeling like the logic of the conversation was running in circles. This time the pause was easily double the length of the last one.

WHO'S NOA?

Mokuba sat and stared at the screen. The dread that had been droning within him for weeks intensified, spiking with panic. He helplessly recalled Gozaburo's words: _"_ _Data degenerates, little brother."_  Mokuba had thought, or at least hoped, that he was lying. If he wasn't...

Mokuba pushed it out of his mind.

"Let's play chess," he said, swallowing the lump out of his throat and reaching for the board. "I'll be white, you be black." He began to arrange the pieces. It was a nice new set, one side made of clear glass, the other from clouded to represent white and black. Apparently it had sufficiently appealed to Gozaburo's aesthetic sensibilities to survive the purge of everything too  _Seto_  about the mansion.

Mokuba finished arranging the pieces. "Okay, pawn to E4." He slid the small, cool glass piece across the two squares. It felt reassuringly solid against his skin.

He had been too busy arranging the pieces to look at the screen, but now his pulse jumped as he looked up.

YOU THINK I WANT TO PLAY CHESS WITH A STUPID CHILD LIKE YOU?

The text flickered silently, white and threatening, staring Mokuba down. When had Seto said that?

"We could..."  _It's not his fault. It's just some stupid error. It won't happen again._ "We could play checkers instead, if you'd prefer..."

Mokuba trailed off as more text appeared. He had never quite realised how indifferent and inhuman that white text could look.

YOU THINK YOU KNOW US?

Mokuba could only stare dumbly back.

YOU THINK YOU'LL EVER BE REAL? NOBODY WANTED YOU. THERE'S A REASON THEY TREATED YOU LIKE A TOY.

Whomever Seto thought he was talking to, it wasn't Mokuba. Mokuba knew he shouldn't be reassured by that, because if Seto couldn't keep track of something that simple then the degeneration was worse than he thought, but he couldn't help feel comforted that Seto didn't mean to direct those sentiments upon him.

"Nii-sama?" Mokuba said.

Immediately a string of nonsensical symbols appeared, pouring out across each line, hashes and asterisks tripping over one another in an incomprehensible mess. Mokuba's eyes flew over them, but there wasn't nothing resembling sense or language to be found.

"Nii-sama," he said again, his voice wavering. There was no effect on the symbols, but he swallowed hard and kept going. "Do you remember the Blue Eyes?"

The text careened on in lunatic nonsense, then came to an abrupt stop.

##############YES. YES I REMEMBER.

Mokuba's mouth broke into a beaming, relieved smile, but he felt tears running freely down his cheeks.

"And you remember riding the jet? How it was just like you always said it would be? The two of us flying together."

He waited for the reply to come. He waited, then waited longer. He began to count the seconds, his foot tapping anxiously against the floor.  _Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen..._

He hit twenty and still no reply had appeared, though he was certain he was counting too fast.

"Nii-sama?"

The caret remained silent and uncomprehending.

"Nii-sama..." Mokuba repeated, the vowels trembling over his lips. "Nii-sama, nii-sama, nii-sama..." He waited, frozen, for a reply to appear, which it didn't, and then struck his fist against the side of the monitor. The black screen shivered with static, but it had no other effect.

He slipped forwards fell from the chair. His knees cracked against the concrete and sent deep, aching stabs of pain through his legs, but he ignored them. He reached both hands out to the humming computer tower and ran his fingers over it. It was ludicrously hot, probably overheating with the strain of keeping his brother conscious, but it was still whirring as loud as ever. The rough, vibrating metal almost burned his fingers.

" _Energy cannot be created or destroyed,"_  rang Seto's voice in his head, a memory from long ago, some impromptu science lesson. Heat was energy.

Mokuba slid his knees forwards, curling his small body around the hunk of plastic. The heat wasn't painful when tempered by his clothing. It filled his stomach and flowed up through his chest, warm and alive, thrumming against him. The corners of the tower dug into his skin, but that didn't matter. He rested his cheek against the dusty top and drew his arms around the plastic casing, holding it tight against him and closing his eyes.

* * *

Mokuba left the basement some forty minutes later. He wandered the house in silence, drifting through the empty rooms, pausing here and there to recall a certain spot in which the memory of Seto was particularly bright. It didn't make him feel better. It made him feel like he was in mourning.

As much as he insisted to himself that he wasn't and that his brother was, in some way, still alive, his mind only drifted cursorily over his next possible options. Entreat Gozaburo for a better computer? Try to build one himself? It already felt as though it was too late; and, perhaps, it was.

 _Seto would never give up trying to save you,_ a little wormy voice in his head chided.  _You're the weak child you always were, dragging him down._

He let the voice drone on, too tired to make any effort to silence it. He continued his slow, pointless meandering through the halls, idly wondering if he would just keep walking until he passed out from exhaustion. Unlikely, considering he spent most of his time sleeping.

His directionless travels were finally halted when he reached the main lounge, under whose door sneaked out a narrow strip of warm light. He paused in the hall and listened to the muffled sound of a television on the other side of the door. He knew who was in there, but strangely he didn't feel compelled to turn around and walk away. He missed his brother's face and his scent with a tight, clenching pain, a longing so intense that it dwarfed his fear of Gozaburo.

And so he opened the door.

Absorbed like this in the television, the figure that sat on the sofa really could be Seto. The cold, drawn expression, the burning eyes, the consummate, willing ignorance of anything or anybody else. The decanter of whisky and the cigar were anomalies, but Mokuba was starting to get used to Gozaburo's habits. He looked normal. He looked like Seto. A perfect mimic.

Gozaburo looked up suddenly, sensing Mokuba's presence, and the displeasure which seeped into his features was emphatically not Seto's. It was too intense, too openly emotional.

"What do you want?"

They held each other's cold gazes for a moment, then Mokuba dropped his. He shuffled his feet unconsciously and gave a low, adolescent shrug. "I don't know."

The father-brother-thing stared him down for a moment longer, then looked back to the screen. "Then get out."

Mokuba observed the length of the sofa, the great plane of space between  _him_ and the nearest armrest. He took several hesitant steps towards it.

"Can I sit here?"

The man looked at him again with those cool, Seto-eyes. "Why?"

"I don't know. Just to sit. Watch TV." He drew in a hard, thin, fortifying breath. "I mean, if we're going to keep playing brothers then we might as well get used to one another's company."

And again the eyes drifted away. "I don't need to 'get used to you' to pull off playing Seto. Learn to act better."

Mokuba didn't leave. He just stood and watched the television, understanding the reports probably far better than Gozaburo thought he could. Then, slow and hesitant and uncomfortable, he moved around to the front of the sofa and sat upon it. The man threw him one final disgusted look, then returned to watching the television. The cigar smell obscured any scent of Seto that might have remained and it made Mokuba want to gag as it wormed its way into his lungs, but he shifted closer all the same. He and Seto used to watch TV together, occasionally. Seto preferred to get his news online, but sometimes he would settle with Mokuba to watch some terrible action movie. He would complain for the entire duration of the film, of course, pointing out every single flaw and technological inaccuracy, but that was half of the fun. Mokuba missed that...

"The fuck are you smirking at?"

The profanity made his heart jolt, and then the memory of his brother collapsed back into reality. Seto never swore, not at him. But Seto was gone. Gozaburo was staring at him in disgust.

"Sorry. I just remembered something funny."

"Did I not tell you to get out?"

"I'll be really quiet, I promise. I'll just sit here."

For a moment Mokuba thought the man was going to strike him.

"You think you can disobey me?"

Mokuba's eyes fluttered closed. "Please, nii-sama. I'll just sit." His eyes opened again and he fixed the creature who wasn't his brother with the same gaze he had been wearing all day, blank and grey, beyond exhausted. "I know you're going to kill me. I don't care. You've already taken everything that I loved." Those eyes, those eyes that had been there to echo back into his own since he was born stared back, all cool and blue and beautiful and so terribly, wonderfully  _Seto_. "Please. Just let me sit."

He didn't try to fight the tears this time. He was far past saving face.

The man gave a quiet, so Seto-like chuckle. "I'm not going to kill you, Mokuba. At least, I don't have plans to. You're useful to me."

"I won't be forever," he breathed. "Even if you don't want me dead, what does it matter?" His voice cracked again and shattered. "He's your  _son_. Don't you care? Don't you miss him? Don't you feel guilty?"

"He's not my son, and neither are you." He bared his teeth and in that instant, wolflike pose every ounce of Seto was banished from his face. "You were my  _tenants_. Seto proved himself quite the unworthy failure, in the end."

"Then why don't you delete him?" Mokuba shot back before he could stop himself. Gozaburo's eyes widened, affronted but amused. Mokuba didn't give him a chance to retort. "You don't need him. You already have all the passwords. Why did you even put him in that computer in the first place? Why didn't you just-" His voice strained and twisted at a broken, half sobbing pitch. "-just throw him into the sea?" He paused very briefly, but Gozaburo didn't cut in. He just stared at him with unreadable, icy hostility. "Does it make you feel better to know you haven't really killed him? Does that help you sleep at night?"

Gozaburo's eyes dropped. Mokuba stared at his expression in incomprehension, trying to understand in the brief moment he had before the man punished him for his insolence what that alien expression meant.

_Shame...?_

"If you would rather I deleted him," Gozaburo said, his eyes flicking back up and wiping away every trace of that dark shadow from his face, "then I will. You haven't been spending much time with him lately. Perhaps you want me to make the decision you're too weak to make yourself."

Mokuba's eyes ran over Gozaburo's face, studying the contours of his brother's expression, searching for the parts of Seto that were still alive within it. That countenance wasn't so very different from Seto, was it? After Gozaburo's death, before they met Yuugi, Seto had often been this cold. The differences, perhaps, were negligible...

Exhaustion finally flowing triumphantly through his bones, Mokuba let his head fall against the back of the sofa and closed his eyes. What would Seto do, if he were here? If it was Mokuba in the computer? The answer to that was simple: he would find a way to save him.

"Nii-sama..." Mokuba's lips shaped the word in near silence. He heard his brother's short, humoured laugh.

"Yes, little brother?"

His eyes opened again to see Seto's face set in a black amusement that, despite knowing that it wasn't really him, that this amusement was at his expense, still sent a warm, familiar shiver through him. He smiled, and thought of every time his brother had saved him, every time they had succeeded, every time he had come for him regardless of the odds. He thought of the burning locket. He thought of the Blue Eyes.

Although he looked at Gozaburo, the answer he gave was not for him. He spoke with a soft, subdued confidence that the passing observer might just mistake for quiet surrender.

"I'll help you, nii-sama."

And that would be quite the mistake to make.


End file.
